Spain approves housing measures after huge protests. Duration may depend on election

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Spain’s interim lower house of parliament has ratified housing measures designed to limit evictions and real estate speculation

Spain’s interim lower house of parliament has ratified housing measures designed to limit evictions and real estate speculation

BARCELONA, Spain -- Spain’s interim lower house of parliament on Thursday ratified housing measures designed to limit evictions and real estate speculation, a day after a general strike and major street protests over the country’s housing cost crunch.

The duration of the approved measures, however, will likely depend on the outcome of a national election set for later this month.

The leading opposition party, the conservative Popular Party, has said that it will repeal the housing measures of the left-wing government if it takes power, which polls indicate is a real possibility.

“Yesterday, the right to housing won on the street and in workplaces, and I hope it will win again at the ballot box,” interim Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez told lawmakers, in reference to Wednesday’s general strike and the upcoming election on Nov. 29.

Spain’s government had tried to push through the measures in October after public anger over soaring rents erupted following the nationally-televised eviction and subsequent death of an 87-year-old woman in Madrid.

But the PP and other conservative parties aligned in parliament to reject the measures. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez responded days later by calling an early election.

The government then waited to try again to pass the measures with a smaller interim parliament, where it and aligned progressive parties had a slightly more favorable distribution of seats.

The government split the measures into two decrees, with one measure that appeared doomed from the start being separated into a second decree so as not to put the rest in danger.

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